Black Pride

10.

Jeremy laughed. "Peaches," was all she heard him say. "So my sis told me much about this school, wanna hear 'bout it, eh?" Jeremy asked. Ayo shook her head. Not while the Chemistry lecture was going on.

Jeremy shrugged and continued pressing his phone. Ayo snatched it from him. "Hey!" He laughed and tried to snatch it back but she dodged and laughed too. Jeremy looked at her back and stifled his laughter. Ayo looked back. She saw the lecturer. He was preparing to give her an orange slip.

"Oh no sir! I'm on your side, I wasn't playing games with him," Ayo tried to protest but the lecturer sighed and just gave her the slip anyway. He wondered why not many people loved Chemistry. Ayo gave Jeremy a bad look and flung his phone at him.

"Look what you caused," she scowled. Jeremy caught his phone and kept it hidden quickly. One way to make Ayo angry was to disturb her during Chemistry, and he wasn't willing to try that again.

~~~

The English lecturer was having a real hard time. Gwen was giving him issues and there was this other student that was a real pain in the butt, number 20. "Wole Soyinka won the Nobel literary prize, why? Because he put his mind to what he learnt. You all have the capacity to become great. In order to be able to fight for people's rights, you should know how to communicate with them," he had said.

"Uhm, actually sir, if I may," number 20 started, as she raised up her hands and stood to speak. Most of the teachers knew her. She was very smart, and challenging. She challenged almost everything she thought was 'not right'. It was no wonder that she had decided to go for Law.

"I believe the key is, not communication, but rather in cooperation. There are times where communication has been severed and cannot be established, yet with a strong cooperation system in place, even the mute can be justified. That was what Wole Soyinka was trying to prove," she said as she closed her book.

"You got that from a book, so you can't actually challenge me because I am teaching from my accumulated facts," he said, trying to justify his mistake.

"Actually sir, my note is empty," she said and showed him and the whole class. Gwen clapped. Most students didn't know what was happening but because of a clap from the front, they all started to clap. Some even cheered louder than the rest. Soon the whole class was clapping and hooting.

"Silence!" The lecturer roared. He was fuming by now. "Number 20, have your seat, and Number 1, stop promoting violence and hooliganism," he said and faced the board to write some stuff on it. Sir Edward was not going to let some silly girl mess with his ego. He turned back to the class again and saw Gwen going to the door, having packed her bag.

"And, where are you headed to, miss?" he asked.

"You asked me to stop promoting violence and hooliganism sir, so I'm going to stop them," Gwen said and giggled. She thought herself a superhero.

Sir Edward face palmed himself and told her to go back to her seat. "You can do that from your seat," he said. She smiled and after giving a short bow, and went back to her seat.

"That was really beautiful," Gwen's seat partner said. She was also a klutz like Gwen thought she was not that high in the clumsy hierarchy.

~~~

Everyone gathered round the two people doing the arm wrestling. One was a girl with an evil grin on her face, and the other was a boy who looked like he had lost all hope.

"C'mon Asher! She's just a girl," Simon shouted angrily amidst the hooting of the crowd of students around him. He was beginning to feel frustrated. He had brought his brother, who was a top athlete to do the arm wrestling with Brie.

"But, you challenged me to an arm wrestling; you didn't tell me I'd be battling your bigger brother," Brie had protested when Simon had told her that she would be contesting with his bigger brother, and not him.

"I challenged you to an arm wrestling but didn't tell you who your opponent would be," he had said and grinned, as his big brother had set his arm ready for the contest.

"Don't worry, I'll take it easy on you," Asher had said and everybody there had laughed.

Now, things were not going according to his plans. He didn't know Brie would be a challenge for his older brother. Brie laughed evilly and scowled loudly as Asher's hands were getting close to the spikes she had set on the table.

"Well, if it's your brother, I'm facing, let's make it a little fun, we'll add spikes to the table, so the loser walks away with a bloody hand," she had said. Simon had thought it would be Brie on the losing side and had agreed hastily. His brother had tried to disagree but Simon had begged him with promises of paying him money when he won.

Asher grunted and tried to lift Brie's hand to no avail. In one fell swoop, she smashed his hands on the spikes. "Ouch," Asher screamed as the fresh blood ran across his palm. He was in his third year and couldn't believe that he had just lost an arm contest to a first year student, who was a girl, and worse still, he would have to treat this newly gotten wound. He shot Simon a reproachful look.

Brie stepped on the table in triumph and gave a loud roar of victory. The students all cheered her loudly and booed Simon and his brother, Asher, whose hand was still bleeding. Just then, a lecturer came by. The once gathered students dispersed immediately, leaving only Brie, Simon and Asher in the center. The lecturer looked at them, then at the spiky table. He put two and two together and gave the three of them orange slips. Simon sighed. 'If things had gone according to his plans, this wouldn't have happened,' he thought.

After the whole courses had been finished for that day, lot of students began going back to their various places, some going to their dorms, some to their houses, and others to the 'Prison Yard'.

Elizabeth and Gwen later met up and walked to their dorm. They entered and were surprised to see Brie, using her laptop, well balanced on her bed with lot of pizza boxes and milkshakes everywhere.

"When did you get back? Because you look like someone who's been here the whole day," Elizabeth said in surprise. Gwen tilted her head a little.

Brie belched. "Hey girls, welcome back, hey Gwen, if you don't mind, pass me that milkshake can, will you? I think there's still something in it," Brie said and pointed to a can that had rolled near Gwen's bedside. Gwen bent down but she didn't see anything.

Elizabeth hissed. That got Brie's attention. "What's up, Lizzy?" She asked as she munched another pizza slice.

Elizabeth removed her earrings and kept them in a box. "When did you come back?" she asked Brie again suspiciously and stood arms akimbo.

"A little earlier before you did," Brie said and grinned. Gwen looked at Brie's laptop.

"What's that?" she said as she pointed to the screen. It was like a live video of the school.

"Oh, that, it's just, uhm, camera views of the school, okay?" Brie said and turned her laptop away from Elizabeth's view. Elizabeth shrugged and continued to undress. Brie looked at Gwen, she was already fast asleep.

Brie smiled as she turned to her laptop once again. She started moving a control pad as the cameras moved towards the school detention zone.

Back at the school, no one suspected that the girl in black clothes, with black lipstick was actually a decoy, as the real person sat in her dormitory, controlling from her laptop.

~~~

Ayo mumbled something as a detention officer stamped her orange slip. Her stay in detention was going to last for seven days. "Thanks a lot Jeremy," she thought and gave him a hard look. He was standing on the line opposite hers. He made a low grunt and looked away.

Ayo was put in cell D2. Ayo walked towards the room among other students. "Universities were not supposed to give people detentions," she thought. Well that was partly true. The real owner of the University, Sir McGregor had died a long time ago and his forty-five year old son had taken over the business. It was a private university, one of the best in California. It even rivaled California's own public university. Kobe McGregor had decided to impose a new set of rules and regulations into the University system, and since it was majorly his, the board could not object.